


A Clever Ruse

by Lassarina Aoibhell (Lassarina)



Category: Final Fantasy XII
Genre: F/M, New Game Plus Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-04
Updated: 2010-04-04
Packaged: 2017-10-08 17:34:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/77882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lassarina/pseuds/Lassarina%20Aoibhell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She must admit that the sky pirate does not lack for clever ruses, but that does not make him any less irritating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Clever Ruse

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pyrefly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pyrefly/gifts).



> This was written for Pyrefly in the initial round of New Game Plus on Dreamwidth.

Queen Ashelia was not expecting the sky pirate's visit that day, though in truth if she had considered it she would have realized that it had been months since last he had been to Rabanastre to plague her with his importuning. In retrospect, she should have been surprised that it had been so long, but such thoughts were far from her mind when she had the more important problems of crop yields, appropriate tax rates, and what to do with those who had broken Imperial law during the occupation to contemplate.

She had the wit to call off her guards before they could do bodily harm to the man casually lounging in her suite, but some small part of her wished she had waited a moment longer to do so, if only for the amusement of watching him best her guards. The expression on his face when a troop of fully armed and armored palace guards prepared to charge was beyond price.

"Your Majesty, what is your will?" her Captain of the Guard asked.

Briefly Ashe wished for Basch—she determinedly did not think of Vossler—who had been able to understand her wishes even when she was unsure. Yet there was no point in wishing for what she could not have; as well wish the treasury would overflow with gil until she could swim in it. It accomplished nothing.

"He means me no harm," she said.

"Truer words never spoken." He rose easily from the couch and made her a sweeping bow. "Good evening, Princess."

"You will address the Queen's Majesty as befits her station," the Captain barked.

"Your pardon, good Captain." Balthier's lips quirked in a faintly mocking smile. "Good evening, Your Majesty."

"I suppose it would be too much to ask for you to make an appointment with my secretary like anyone else," Ashe said.

"Perish the thought. I am hardly anyone else." He grinned.

Ashe fought her urge to smile back, and instead nodded to her guard. "You may leave us," she said crisply.

"Your Majesty," he protested. She heard the implication: _your honour (or rather your chastity) is at risk if we leave you alone with a strange man, to speak nothing of your bodily safety._

"Lord Bunansa aided me greatly in reclaiming my throne," she said tartly, "and had many opportunities to cause me harm, which he consistently failed to take advantage of. I hardly think he is apt to strike me down at this late date." She saw Balthier's eyelids flicker at her deliberate reference to his former standing, and chose to focus on her amusement at his discomfort rather than her guilt for causing it.

Her captain opened his mouth and left it thus, as though he sought some way to express his concerns without insulting his monarch.

"Besides, I am not inept at wielding a blade myself should it come to that," Ashe continued. "Now, I have bid you go." Let them spread what rumors they would; anyone coming with a marriage suit would know her no maiden.

Her captain saluted, resentment evident on his face beneath the helm, and led his men out of her suite. The door closed, and the unsubtle rattle of armour beyond it was intended to notify her that he and his men would stir not one step farther than was absolutely required by her order.

"I'm flattered by your trust, Princess," Balthier murmured.

She knew that tone, and she was in no mood to play his word games. "Speak your reason for coming, and be gone," she snapped.

"My reason for coming? Why, to see you, of course." Without waiting for an invitation—as if he ever would—he sprawled across the couch once more. "What more reason do I need?"

Ashe eyed him suspiciously, and was met with an innocent smile that only made her more wary. "And yet you could not enter by the front door." This was his fourth such visit in the eighteen months since _Bahamut,_ and not once had he presented himself as was proper, preferring instead to arrive in unexpected fashions that had at one point included sliding down a rope into the middle of her council chamber. To be fair, that particular escapade had enlivened a deadly dull meeting, but it was still inappropriate.

"Well, that's not exactly a challenge, is it?" he said. "Hardly worthy of my skills."

"Must everything be a game to you?" She meant the question to be sarcastic, but found it came out genuinely curious instead.

"I find little fulfillment in doing things the easy way, Princess. Rewards are sweeter when one earns them."

"Now _that_ sounds more like something Fran would say—and since when do you embrace an honest day's work?"

"I never said anything about an honest day's work." He wagged a finger at her playfully.

"I am weary of your games, pirate." In truth, she wasn't, but she was weary of the half-truths and circling, weary of wondering when next he would disrupt her life. However clever the ruse—and it was always clever—she would have preferred him to either stay or go, yet she knew the impossibility of asking such a thing.

He stared at her intently, his expression unwontedly sober, and then shrugged. "Well, nothing ventured," he muttered to himself.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Why? You've done nothing amiss." Just like that, like the flash of light when touching a crystal, his mien shifted back to the cheerful, though still more serious than she might have expected. "I wanted to see you, Ashe. I didn't want to wade through piles of secretaries and guards to do so."

"I am sure they are grateful not to have your boot prints on their court finery," she replied. Then she closed her lips firmly. She was not, was _not,_ going to answer the unspoken question in his statement. As a princess, she had been ill able to afford such weakness; as queen, it was impossible.

"You _are_ going to be difficult, aren't you." The tone of his voice made it more statement than question.

"Not ten minutes ago you said rewards are sweeter when earned. Do you now recant?"

"No." He let his hands drop to his knees and sighed, then sat up and faced her earnestly. "Give me a simple answer, then, if such a thing be not too much to ask of a queen," he said. "Do I waste my time in coming here?"

Ashe clenched her hands into fists until her nails dug deep into her palms, and ignored the way her heart beat faster. She was no girl caught in a campfire tale, not anymore. She had responsibilities. She cast aside her jumbled thoughts and seized on a simple enough question. "That depends entirely on what you seek when you come," she said with great care.

For a moment he looked like he wanted to veer off into a sarcastic play on words, and she would have welcomed it as reprieve, but she had forgotten that when he wished it, he could be as focused as anyone else. "Have I not already said?" he murmured, sounding oddly defeated. "You."

Ashe had to close her eyes for a moment as the intensity of his expression called up the memory of Rasler's face, unguarded and honest on the morning after their wedding. When she opened them again, his gaze had not left her face. Mentally she cursed the trap of her birth with a passion she had not dared give voice to ere now, but she had not spent three years hunting her birthright to throw it all away. Not when Dalmasca needed her. "I cannot fly away with you," she said, "and you will not stay." She hated the way her voice cracked on the last word, and cursed it for a weakness.

"Not forever, no," he agreed. "But do you require a lover attendant on your every moment and whim?"

"I should be loathe to trip over someone at every turn," she muttered.

"There, you see?" He half reached out a hand, all pretense of cleverness and carefree behaviour discarded. "Can there not be a middle ground?"

She stared at his hand, the brilliant array of rings that gleamed upon it, and thought of the simple platinum band he had returned to her with a note. He was infuriating—it was only the simple truth—but she had to admit, at least to herself, that she looked forward to these visits.

"To speak only for myself, yes," she said slowly. "But I do not speak only for myself."

"Even queens can be allowed an indulgence or two." He extended his hand farther. She need only reach out and their fingers would touch.

It was bitter to admit even to herself, but she was afraid to take this step, to admit to wanting him. "If I do this," she said slowly, and marked the way joy rushed to infuse his expression, "you cannot—you _must_ not—thieve within the borders of Dalmasca."

Balthier groaned. "Between you and Larsa, there will be nowhere left I can pirate," he grumbled. Then his eyes brightened. "Wait, I can still plague Al-Cid." His glee at the notion was entirely out of proportion.

"Promise me," Ashe insisted, clasping her hands tightly in her lap so she would not do something foolish. She would have enough difficulty dealing with her Council's objections to her taking a lover; she could not have him wreaking havoc with her economy in the meantime.

"Very well. I promise that, until such time as Your Majesty Queen Ashelia B'Nargin Dalmasca permits, I shall commit no act of piracy within the borders of Dalmasca."

She was slightly taken aback by the formality of his phrasing, and saw by the look of his eyes that he was quite serious.

A lengthy pause settled between them, taut with silence.

"Ashe, as a friend—do not make me beg, will you?" he entreated.

Slowly she reached out her hand until their fingers touched. His skin was startlingly warm; when had she gotten so cold?

His fingers clasped tightly around hers, but he did not speak.

"A clever ruse to avoid being clapped in irons, pirate," she said at last, with rather less sarcasm than was her wont.

He grinned. "I hoped you would appreciate it."

Ashe merely tightened her fingers around his hand, and took a moment to appreciate their truce before she leaned forward to kiss him.


End file.
